Letters to the Editor

Oct. 25, 2015

Obama, Putin and Syria

Re “Obama’s doctrine of restraint” (Oct. 13): Roger Cohen fails to articulate an American national security interest in Syria or Ukraine worth risking American lives, fails to say what specific actions President Obama could have taken that would have brought about different outcome, and fails to show why a robust United States military intervention in Syria or Ukraine would not have been as horrific to America as Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.

We hear the terms “vacuum” and “ambivalence” once again, but what good result has the perception of an American “presence” and “assertiveness” brought? The Russians have a much more historical interest in the affairs of Ukraine and Syria than we do: So let them have them. They can own these quagmires.

John E. Colbert Arroyo Seco, N.M.

Mr. Cohen seems to imply that the United States should have gotten more, not less, involved in Afghanistan, Libya and Syria, without providing any analysis of the potential adverse consequences of doing so. Haven’t we learned by now that the Middle East is essentially a snake pit from which it is very difficult to extricate oneself? Restraint is often the most prudent policy. Don’t we wish we had exercised more restraint in Vietnam in the 1960s?

Robert W. Bertrand Paradise Valley, Ariz.

Mr. Cohen correctly identifies a critical drawback in President Obama’s foreign policy when he states that President Vladimir Putin “has reasserted Russian power in the vacuum created by American retrenchment.” The inherent deficiency in the administration’s irresolute policy toward the main conflict zones — Syria, Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan — has now emboldened the instigator and perpetuator of the Ukraine war to insert Russia forcefully into the Syrian war.

Mr. Obama has strived to disengage the United States from these intractable wars born in the dissolution of created states into failed states. Concluding that none can be resolved quickly, the president prefers to leave it to local antagonists to sort it out. But this tactic hasn’t been successful in any of these theaters.

Mr. Putin’s intentions in Syria mirror those behind his intervention in Ukraine: to bluntly re-establish Russia as a major force in world politics. Rather than seeking settlements to these conflicts, he reaches for power bases to ramp up levels of influence and control in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Can anyone imagine Mr. Putin favoring a solution in Syria with human rights components when he is actively undermining such rights in Russia?

The ultimate byproduct of Mr. Obama’s policy will be an interpretation by Mr. Putin of an American retreat from responsibility in world affairs. Such an outcome will be detrimental to any efforts toward peace.

Dan Donovan Dungarvan, Ireland

Mr. Cohen directs a lot of criticism at President Obama’s Syrian strategy without offering another course of action that he thinks would have worked or would still be working better. He also suggests that President Putin, by taking the action that he has in Syria, is somehow doing a better job than the United States is in the region. It is possible that by doing things differently in Syria the United States could have done a better job, but there is a implication here that somehow the United States, and therefore Mr. Obama, is responsible for the mess in Syria and has bungled cleaning it up.

Terrence P. Lambert Brookhaven, N.Y.

Family-first in Denmark

Re “Something not rotten in Denmark” (Oct. 20): Paul Krugman alludes to the family-first policies of the Danish welfare state. The government programs he mentions — from free college to subsidized day care — are all meant to support dual-career families. Family values in Denmark mean that fathers can leave work early to pick up their children from school and that mothers can expect to have careers. As we Americans struggle to balance work and family in our decidedly work-first nation, we could benefit from this experience. While Denmark is not perfect, it can still be a nation that inspires.